"There you go Katie, all patched up." Chen was treating the girl, who was being hugged protectively by her very relieved father, and understandably so. She tried to stay calm, to hide the worry in her voice. It was bad enough treating complete strangers but when it was someone you know, someone you see and work with every day, the pain and the anguish you feel are multiplied.

Chen stepped outside the curtain, knowing that the man in there would want time alone with his understandably upset and shaken daughter.

All the emotion was starting to get to her but she was determined to keep working, knowing that if she slowed down, she woldn't be able to cope. She took a deep breath to compose herself. She turned around and caught a glimse of Carter, nervously pacing the corridor.

It had been obvious for a long time, to her at least, that Carter had deep feelings for Aby and vise versa, even if they didn't realise it themselves. She couldn't begin to imagine what he was feeling.

* * *

"Lydia, has that girl arrived yet?" Carter asked, with a sense of urgency in his voice.

He found it hard to say anything at the moment, with out running the risk of loosing his composure.

"Chen's working on her in curtain 2" she replied, but instantly regretted what she had just told him. "Dr. Carter..." she started to call after him but it made no difference and Lydia didn't really expect it to.

"Chen, is that your patient in there?" he asked as she stepped out into the hall. He was just focused on finding out the truth, blinded from all logic and reasoning. He couldn't stand not knowing.

"What?" Dr. Chen looked up from the patient's chart she had just taken off the rapidly growing pile on the desk, in an effort to keep things running, despite everyone's worry. No one really felt like doing a lot since word had spread about Abby and it was beginning to show. The large number of agitated patients and family members were not helping much either.

"Carter, no" she said once she realised. No one was going to get in his way, Jimg-Mei knew. He had already pulled open the curtain.

"Where's Abby?!" he demanded from the even more frightened little girl. He carried on, oblivious to the father's growing anger, like it was somehow her fault. On some level, it was. Abby went in to save her, but placing blame wasn't going to help Abby.

"Carter!" Chen grabbed his shoulder and pulled him outside. He resisted her force and carried on. "Hey Malik, give me a hand!"

Both of them forced him into the corridor. She really wanted to confront him, away from the stares of the patients and staff but he was frantic and she was having a hard time stopping him going back to Katie, who she could hear crying, even over Carter's shouts of protest.

"Carter!" She grabbed him again and forced him to look her in the face. "Stop it! I know you're upset and worried about Abby, we all are. But yelling at a frightened little child isn't going to help. She doesn't know anyhting, all right? So just calm down."

The doctor's emotion changed instantly and where, only a second ago, there was anger and aggression, lashing out at everyone around, there was now just pain and anxiety. Carter fell to his knees, his head in his hands, sobbing in front of everyone. Chan helped him up and ushered him into the lounge.

What the hell could she say to him to calm his fears? Would anything help? She hoped, for Carter's sake, that Abby and Susan would get here soon.

* * *

Susan sat in the back of the tension filled ambulance on the agonising trip back to County General trying, rather unsuccessfully to forget who the patient was, lying helplessly in front of her. She had tried to help monitor Abby but the paramedic in the back with her had insisted she rest, and Susan didn't have the neergy of the inclination to argue.

Susan knew that there wasn't anything anyone could do until they got back to the hospital but that knowledge really didn't help any when your friend and co-worker is lu=ying unconscious, close to death.

Susan was staring down at the floor in a daze and it barely registered that someone was calling her name.

"Dr. Lewis? Dr. Lewis!" The woman working on Abby gestured to the guy driving the vehicle, who was holding up the radio.

He turned breifly, as they waited at traffic lights, and looked back at Susan, his eyes filled with sympathy. "I'm calling it in, do you want to say something?"

Susan snapped back to reality, or as close to reality as anyone could hope to get in a situation like this, and reached forward. "Yeah, I'll do it." The guy nodded at her and pulled back into the moving stream of traffic.

She took a deep breath in an attempt to compose herself and took another look at their patient.

"County General, this is unit 37, do you copy?"

* * *

The staff in the ER milled around the admit desk, waiting for any news. although they were still in a stae of shock and disbelief, they had had time to get as used to the idea as they could and the general mood of the department was calmer than it had been earlier that night. The patients and their families had, thankfully, picked up on the mood of the doctors and nurses and had stopped pestering people for treatment. There were still two or three people sitting in chairs drinking coffe, inwardly annoyed and impatient but understanding that there was something far more important going on.

Behind the desk, people were quiet, only whispering when necessary. no one was really in a modd for conversation, every once in a while handing over a chart or some lab results, exchanging scilent nods or subdued smiles, in solumn recognition of how the other was feeling.

Chen was comforting Carter in the lounge. everyone was glad that he wasn't around. No one would know quite what to say to him, frightened that he might loose it again after his outbust earlier.

The scilence was broken as the MICN sparked to life and a shril beeping filled the air, making everyone jump. They all knew exactly who the voice on the other end belonged to and gave it their full attention.

"Susan, this is Luka, go ahead." He grabbed the receiver off the counter and spoke into it with a calm, professional voice, no doubt betraying his true feelings.

"We're coming in now guys, be prepared." Susan's voice was shaky and hesitant, so much so that th emagnitude of emotions were even evident over the crackley, unclear radio.

"She's got a..." Susan was close to tears. "A deep penetrating wound to the lower right abdomen. BP's 80/40, pulse ox. 84."

The nurses and doctors exchanged worried looks, knowing that that was dangerously low and they were going to have one hell of a fight on their hands.

Susan carried on feeding them the information, in spite of the general feeling of nausea that was threatening to take over. "She's very weak, she's lost a lot of blood. Have 4 units standing by by and..." Luka cut her off.

"Susan, we know the routine, don't worry." His voice was filled with understanding and remorse, after all, he knew what it was like to have people close to you die, and knew the feeling of not being able to do anything to help. 'But Abby's not going to die', he thought, 'and we will be able to help her.'

"ETA?" he asked, all ready to leap into action.

"About 10 minutes."

All the staff gathered anxiously around Luka, imediatly deployed to do their jobs. 'Right' Luka though, replacing the reciever in it's holder, 'focus. We can save her if we try.' He had no doubt in his mind that similar thoughts were rushing through everyone else on the trauma team. They all wanted one thing: To save Abby.